Horn shield



' Jan. 17, 1961 I c, BROWN 2,968,277.

I HORN SHIELD Filed March 18, 1959 Fig INVENTOR. 3 Charles R. Brown I ATTORNEY United States Patent HORN SHIELD Charles R. Brown, P.0. Box 56, Freedom, Pa.

Filed Mar. 18, 1959, Ser. No. 800,129

1 Claim. (Cl. 116-137) This invention relates to a horn shield and, more particularly, to a shield which may be detachably mounted on the mouth of a pneumatic horn mounted outside of a vehicle, such as a truck, so as to prevent entry of snow into the horn.

In the past, attempts have been made to shield vehicle horns from the elements, such as rain or snow, but such shields have the outstanding disadvantage of muffling or muting the sound emanating from the horn, therefore have met with disfavor by truckdrivers and the like. A further disadvantage is that they are of complicated design and are expensive to manufacture, also they include horizontally projecting portions which serve as a ledge for holding deposits of snow, thereby permitting a build-up or accumulation of snow to such extent as to fail in their intended purpose.

An object of the present invention is to provide a detachable shield for mounting on the mouth of a pneumatic vehicle horn, which shield is devoid of the above named disadvantages and which will not mute the sound or reduce the effectiveness of the horn, and at the same time will provide a reliable shield to prevent entry of snow into the funnel shape of the horn which would otherwise tend to clog and mute sound emanating from the horn.

A further object of the invention is to provide a horn shield of one piece or unitary construction which is very simple in construction and which may be easily manufactured by mass production methods at extremely low cost.

Other objects and advantages will become more apparent from a study of the following description taken along with the accompanying drawing wherein:

Fig. 1 is a side elevational view of a portion of a pneumatic vehicle horn having a shield mounted thereon embodying the principles of the present invention;

Fig. 2 is a perspective view of the shield shown in Fig. 1; and

Fig. 3 is a perspective view of a modified form of shield.

Referring more particularly to Figs. 1 and 2 of the drawing, numeral 1 denotes a fragmentary or bell portion of a horn for mounting on a vehicle, such as on the outside of a truck, which horn may be pneumatically operated and electrically actuated, or of any other well known construction. Horn 1 is supported on a bracket 2 which may be mounted on the outside front portion of the truck. Onto the mouth or rim portion 3 of the funnel part of the horn, there may be detachably mounted a shield comprising a flat disc 6 of sheet metal, such as aluminum or steel, having integral prongs terminating in bent end portions 4 which snugly embrace the rim or perimeter of the mouth portion 3. Arms 5 2,968,277 Patented Jan. 1"7, 1961 pring metal or treated so'as to provide springines s to assure a tight grip on the rim portion 3. The shield may be stamped out in the form of a one piece blank from flat stock, which blank may include the arms 5 extending radially outwardly of the blank which are later bent to a position almost at right angles to shield 6. The shield assembly may also be made of plastic (reinforced by glass fibers) or other suitable material.

An important feature of the present invention is to provide a substantial spacing between disc 6 and the rim or mouth portion 3 of the horn, which spacing is preferably of the order of 1 /2 inches in order to allow the sound emanating from the horn to be unimpeded or uninterrupted by shield 6 and thus not decrease in intensity. Moreover, such spacing allows snow which falls downwardly between shield 6 and rim 3 to fall freely because of the large spacing, instead of accumulating in said space as would happen if the spacing were small.

Thus as a vehicle is driven forwardly, snow which otherwise would be driven into the horn will be arrested and deflected radially outwardly by the shield. When the vehicle is parked snow falling on the shield will not collect thereon.

I have also found that a fiat disc provides the optimum shape since sounds are not muted thereby and since no horizontally projecting portion is provided which would serve as a ledge on which deposits of snow may accumulate and eventually clog the horn. Furthermore, even if some snow or ice would accumulate on shield 6, it would be very easy to scrape it off because of the fiat surface of shield 6. That is to say, the ordinary small scraper usually carried by the truck driver can be easily applied to both surfaces of the shield 6.

Fig. 3 shows a modification of the shield comprising a flat disc 8 to which is secured wires 9 and 10 of spring metal by virtue of the soldered or welded joints 11, said Wires including substantially right angularly extending portions 13 which terminate in end or clip portions 14. Such clip portions 14 are adapted to form a yieldable and detachable, spring connection when clipped onto the rim 3 of the horn in substantially the same manner as portions 4 in Fig. 1.

The spacing between the shield and horn in both modifications should exceed 1 inch for best results, and preferably should be of the order of 1 /2 inches, although small variation may be made without fully destroying the effectiveness of the present invention.

While the shield may be slightly bulged forwardly somewhat in the shape of a bullet to give a streamline efifect, if desired for appearance sake, this would not be as effective a design as a fiat disc for the reasons pointed out above.

Thus it will be seen that I have provided an efficient detachable shield for a vehicle horn which is exposed to the elements, which shield is effective to prevent entry of snow otherwise driven in by forward movement of the truck and which allows free fall of snow in front and behind the shield without any tendency of accumulation; furthermore I have provided a horn shield which will not mute or decrease the intensity of the sound emanating from the horn and at the same time will completely prevent entry or accumulation of snow in the horn which might otherwise mute or reduce the sound.

While I have illustrated and described several embodiments of my invention, it will be understood that these are by way of illustration only, and that various changes and modifications may be made within the contemplation of my invention and within the scope of the following claim.

I claim:

In combination with the bell of an automobile horn, a substantially flat disc having an area at least as great as that of the horn bell, said disc being spacedfrom References Cited in the file of this patent said bell, and a plurality of arms interconnecting said 10 ,777,416

UNITED STATES PATENTS Revell Oct. 8, McArthur Sept. 9, Hewitt Aug. 24, Lemmon Sept. 21, Messick Jan. 15, 

